Notable Deaths on January 19

January 19 has 100 recorded notable deaths across history, from 520 to 2026. This focused page highlights 20 people with the strongest available profile context.

Robert Eugene Brashers

1999 — Robert Eugene Brashers

American serial killer and rapist (born 1958)

By · Wikipedia

Notable Deaths 100 source records 520 – 2026

Major events on January 19

See what else happened on this day in history.

  1. 1946 General Douglas MacArthur establishes the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo to try Japanese war criminals. Source
  2. 1829 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust: The First Part of the Tragedy receives its premiere performance. Source

Did you know about Robert Eugene Brashers

Robert Eugene Brashers was an American serial killer and mass murderer who committed at least eight murders in Kentucky, Missouri, South Carolina and Texas between 1990 and 1998.

Did you know about Henry Howard

As a fellow translator and imitator of classical Latin authors, his name is closely linked in literature with that of the poet Sir Thomas Wyatt, about whom he wrote an elegy, the only poem published in his life.

Did you know about Don Simpson

Donald Clarence Simpson was an American film producer, screenwriter, and actor, known for his work on blockbuster films of the 1980s and 1990s.

Did you know about William O. Douglas

Nominated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939, Douglas was confirmed at the age of 40, becoming one of the youngest justices appointed to the court.

Did you know about Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

Proudhon became a member of the French Parliament after the Revolution of 1848, whereafter he referred to himself as a federalist.


More major people who died on January 19

Notable people are ranked by substantive profile depth and public notability.

1547 Henry Howard

Henry Howard

Earl of Surrey, English poet (born 1516)
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, was an English nobleman, politician and poet. He was one of the founders of English Renaissance poetry and was the last known person to have been executed at the insistence of King Henry VIII. As a fellow translator and imitator of classical Latin authors, his name is closely linked in literature with that of the poet Sir Thomas Wyatt, about whom he wrote an elegy, the only poem published in his life. Owing largely to the powerful position of his father Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, Henry took a prominent part in court life, and served as a soldier both in France and in Scotland. He was a man of reckless temper, which involved him in many quarrels, and finally brought upon him the wrath of the ageing Henry VIII. He was arrested, tried for treason and beheaded on Tower Hill.
1996 Don Simpson

Don Simpson

American actor, producer, and screenwriter (born 1943)
Donald Clarence Simpson was an American film producer, screenwriter, and actor, known for his work on blockbuster films of the 1980s and 1990s. Simpson entered the film industry in the 1970s and worked at Warner Bros. and Paramount Pictures. He eventually began a professional partnership with Jerry Bruckheimer, and together, they produced hit films such as Flashdance (1983), Beverly Hills Cop (1984), Top Gun (1986), and The Rock (1996), the latter released posthumously. As his stature in Hollywood grew, Simpson became notorious for his debauched lifestyle, which included severe and longstanding substance abuse, and he ultimately died from heart failure caused by an overdose of cocaine and prescription drugs. By the time of his death, his and Bruckheimer's films had grossed over $3 billion worldwide.
1980 William O. Douglas

William O. Douglas

American lawyer and jurist, US Supreme Court associate justice (born 1898)
William Orville Douglas was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1939 to 1975. Douglas was known for his strong progressive and civil libertarian views and is often cited as the most liberal justice in the U.S. Supreme Court’s history. Nominated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939, Douglas was confirmed at the age of 40, becoming one of the youngest justices appointed to the court. He is the longest-serving U.S. Supreme Court justice in history, having served for 36 years and 209 days.
1865 Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

French philosopher and politician (born 1809)
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon was a French anarchist, socialist, philosopher, and economist who founded mutualist philosophy and is considered by many to be the "father of anarchism". He was the first person to call himself an anarchist, and is widely regarded as one of anarchism's most influential theorists. Proudhon became a member of the French Parliament after the Revolution of 1848, whereafter he referred to himself as a federalist. Proudhon described the liberty he pursued as the synthesis of community and individualism. Some consider his mutualism to be part of individualist anarchism while others regard it to be part of social anarchism.
2013 Earl Weaver

Earl Weaver

American baseball player and manager (born 1930)
Earl Sidney Weaver was an American professional baseball manager, author, and television color commentator. Weaver played in minor league baseball as a second baseman from 1948 to 1960. In 1956, he began his managerial career, serving as a player–manager for five seasons before he stopped playing to concentrate on managing, without ever having played in Major League Baseball (MLB). He progressed through the minor league system before going on to become a manager in the Major Leagues with the Baltimore Orioles, winning a World Series championship in 1970. He was a three-time Manager of the Year. In 1996, he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
1729 William Congreve

William Congreve

English playwright and poet (born 1670)
William Congreve was an English playwright, satirist and poet. He played a major role in shaping English comedy, and is often regarded by literary critics as one of the greatest playwrights of the Restoration period. The popularity of his plays in the late 17th and early 18th centuries was central to the development of satirical comedy of manners, and he became recognised as a seminal figure of Restoration literature. Although he wrote several commercially successful works, Congreve is best remembered today for his quotes, such as, "O fie, miss, you must not kiss and tell", and "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned".
2007 Hrant Dink

Hrant Dink

Turkish-Armenian journalist and activist (born 1954)
Hrant Dink was a Turkish-Armenian journalist, human rights activist, founder and editor-in-chief of Agos. As editor-in-chief of the bilingual Turkish-Armenian newspaper Agos, Dink was a prominent member of the Armenian minority in Turkey best known for advocating Turkish–Armenian reconciliation and human and minority rights in Turkey. He was often critical of both Turkey's denial of the Armenian genocide and of the Armenian diaspora's campaign for its international recognition. Dink was prosecuted three times for "insulting Turkishness", while receiving numerous death threats from Turkish nationalists.
2000 Amatu'l-Bahá Rúhíyyih Khánum

Amatu'l-Bahá Rúhíyyih Khánum

a Baháʼí Faith Hand of the Cause of God and wife of Shoghi Effendi (born 1910)
Amatu'l-Bahá Rúhíyyih Khánum was an American-born Canadian Hand of the Cause of the Baháʼí Faith. She was the wife of Shoghi Effendi, who, in accordance with the Will and Testament of his grandfather ʻAbdu'l-Bahá, was appointed to the station of Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith. He become the Guardian of the Baháʼí Faith between 1921 and 1957. Appointed as a Hand of the Cause in 1952, her primary responsibility was to expand and protect the global Baháʼí community. In this capacity, she was among the leading Hands of the Cause who, following Effendi's death in 1957, took on the role of ensuring the transfer of the religion's supreme legal authority to the Universal House of Justice, which has governed out of Haifa, Israel, since 1963.
2015 Michel Guimond

Michel Guimond

Canadian lawyer and politician (born 1953)
Michel Guimond was a Canadian politician. From 1987 to 1993 he served as a city councillor in Boischatel, Quebec. After this, he ran in the 1993 federal election for the Bloc Québécois. He was elected into the House of Commons of Canada as the member from Beauport—Montmorency—Orléans. He was re-elected in the 1997 and 2000 federal elections and in the 2004 federal election. In the 2004 and 2008 elections, he won in Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord before being defeated in the 2011 federal election. A lawyer, he has served as the Bloc critic of Parliamentary Affairs, Transport and to the Auditor General. He then served as whip and deputy whip of the Bloc Québécois, and was also the vice-chair of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.
1636 Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger

Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger

Flemish painter (born1561)
Marcus Gheeraerts was a Flemish artist working at the Tudor court, described as "the most important artist of quality to work in England in large-scale between Eworth and van Dyck". He was brought to England as a child by his father Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder, also a painter. He became a fashionable portraitist in the last decade of the reign of Elizabeth I under the patronage of her champion and pageant-master Sir Henry Lee. He introduced a new aesthetic in English court painting that captured the essence of a sitter through close observation. He became a favorite portraitist of James I's queen Anne of Denmark, but fell out of fashion in the late 1610s.
2006 Anthony Franciosa

Anthony Franciosa

American actor (born 1928)
Anthony George Franciosa, also billed as Tony Franciosa, was an American actor. He began his career on stage and made a breakthrough portraying the brother of the drug addict in the play A Hatful of Rain, which earned him a nomination for the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play. He reprised his role in its subsequent film adaptation, for which he won the 1957 Venice Film Festival Award for Best Actor, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor.
1869 Carl Reichenbach

Carl Reichenbach

German chemist and philosopher (born 1788)
Karl Ludwig Freiherr von Reichenbach, known as Carl Reichenbach, was a German chemist, geologist, metallurgist, naturalist, industrialist and philosopher, and a member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences. He is best known for his discoveries of several chemical products of economic importance, extracted from tar, such as eupione, waxy paraffin, pittacal and phenol. He also dedicated his last years to researching an unproved field of energy combining electricity, magnetism and heat, emanating from all living things, which he called the Odic force.
1984 Max Bentley

Max Bentley

Canadian ice hockey player and coach (born 1920)
Maxwell Herbert Lloyd Bentley was a Canadian professional ice hockey player who played for the Chicago Black Hawks, Toronto Maple Leafs, and New York Rangers in the National Hockey League (NHL) as part of a professional and senior career that spanned 20 years. He was the NHL's leading scorer twice in a row, and in 1946 won the Hart Trophy as the most valuable player. He played in four All-Star Games and was twice named to a post-season All-Star team.
2017 Miguel Ferrer

Miguel Ferrer

American actor (born 1955)
Miguel José Ferrer was an American actor. His breakthrough role was as Bob Morton in the 1987 film RoboCop. Other film roles include Harbinger in Hot Shots! Part Deux (1993), Quigley in Blank Check, Eduardo Ruiz in Traffic (2000) and Vice President Rodriguez in Iron Man 3 (2013). Ferrer's notable television roles include FBI Agent Albert Rosenfield on Twin Peaks, Dr. Garret Macy on Crossing Jordan (2001–2007) and NCIS Assistant Director Owen Granger on NCIS: Los Angeles (2012–2017).
1990 Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh

Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh

Indian guru and mystic (born 1931)
Osho, also known as Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, Acharya Rajneesh, and simply Rajneesh, was an Indian godman, and founder of the new religious movement, the Rajneesh movement. He rejected institutional religions, insisting that spiritual experience could not be organized into any one system of religious dogma. As a guru, he advocated meditation and taught a unique form called dynamic meditation. Rejecting traditional ascetic practices, he encouraged his followers to embrace life fully while remaining unattached to worldly desires.
2012 Sarah Burke

Sarah Burke

Canadian skier (born 1982)
Sarah Jean Burke was a Canadian freestyle skier who was a pioneer of the superpipe event. She was a five-time Winter X Games gold medallist, and won the world championship in the halfpipe in 2005. She successfully lobbied the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to have the event added to the Olympic program for the 2014 Winter Olympics. She was considered a medal favourite in the event. Burke died following a training accident in Utah in 2012.
2012 Rudi van Dantzig

Rudi van Dantzig

Dutch ballet dancer and choreographer (born 1933)
Rudi van Dantzig was a Dutch choreographer, company director, and writer. He was a pivotal figure in the rise to world renown of Dutch ballet in the latter half of the twentieth century. He was co-director and then artistic director of the Dutch National Ballet from 1968 and 1991, and later did choreography for major companies such as Ballet Rambert, The Royal Ballet, the Royal Danish Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, and the Paris Opera Ballet.
2013 Stan Musial

Stan Musial

American baseball player and manager (born 1920)
Stanley Frank Musial, nicknamed "Stan the Man", was an American professional baseball player. Widely considered to be one of the greatest and most consistent hitters in baseball history, Musial spent 22 seasons as an outfielder and first baseman in Major League Baseball (MLB), playing for the St. Louis Cardinals from 1941 to 1944 and from 1946 to 1963. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1969 in his first year of eligibility.
1930 Frank P. Ramsey

Frank P. Ramsey

British mathematician, philosopher and economist (born 1903)
Frank Plumpton Ramsey was a British philosopher, mathematician, and economist who made major contributions to all three fields before his death at the age of 26. He was a close friend of Ludwig Wittgenstein and, as an undergraduate, translated Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus into English. He was also influential in persuading Wittgenstein to return to philosophy and Cambridge. Like Wittgenstein, he was a member of the Cambridge Apostles, the secret intellectual society, from 1921.

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